HBO's Power Rangers
by Zarius
Summary: Inspired by several online Power Rangers Fan Productions. Journey into a braver world where the Power Rangers have scattered to the far winds as the Machine mainframe tightens it's grip on the human race. The Silver Guardians plan a takeover, Kimberly wants to get married, Jason is a nomad, Adam wants to bring forth a new Order, and Tommy Oliver is a ghost...
1. The Name On Her Lips

Vows meant something in the old days.

A pledge to defend, to honor, to preserve.

As Kimberly Hart gazed upon her reflection in the mirror, the breathtaking beauty of her wedding dress awoke memories of those vows, for this was the ultimate commitment. There would be no going back from it.

She paid for the dress, and, still wearing it, walked out of the worn down fashion store towards the rickety van parked outside of it. A slender, young man with a mullet and half-torn shirt and jeans was working feverishly on the engine, trying to get it running again.

"Hey, I'm wearing a bargain, let me know if we hit the jackpot" she said, twirling around in the dress excitedly. The man seemed disinterested.

"I'm sure you look fine" he said.

"Hey,

"Jason, look at me" she said.

"Why did you want to marry me Kim?" Jason replied.

"Let's not start that again, we're only hours away from eloping" Kimberly replied.

"Give me the answer and I'll give you the seal of approval on the 'I dos'" Jason said, persisting with the inquisition.

Kimberly stayed silent.

"It's my name is'nt it? Reminds you of him" he said

"That's not the reason" Kimberly replied.

"Don't bullshit me on this" Jason continued, finally turning around to greet Kimberly with raging eyes.

"Jason, you're just getting cold feet, that's it. You're a little hesitant, so was I, but I understand, ok? This is a big leap for the two of us and it's ok to feel like you want to come away from the edge..."

"I've gone just about over the edge for you, I've been an honest man, an honourable man, and you can't seem to indulge me with a little honesty of your own" he said.

The tension was intense, the nerves of both were shot, it had been a trying day, a day they had spent on the run from forces that had a tight stranglehold on thier world. They were prepared to take on whatever the planet threw at them, but for Kimberly Hart and Jason Newton of Pride Valley, Angel Grove was beckoning, and with it, everything associated with the past.

A past Kimberly would not be open to this particular Jason with.

About the wars with Rita and Zedd's clan, about the selfless hours spent saving the lives of complete strangers while tearing thier city and worlds apart clashing with collosal monsters with their fierce and merciless battle machines.

About the two other important men in their lives. One of whom was also called Jason.

The other was a ghost.

Yet the spectre of both were threatning to sever the ties Kimberly was trying to establish with the man who would be her future.

The weight on his shoulders was heavy, and she did not know how best to lift it.

"I'm going to listen to the radio and chill a bit" said Kimberly, electing to let him cool off rather than make any herculean effort to ease his pain.

What could she say to him? That he was RIGHT? That she loved him because she saw traits of the Jason she knew in him?

She got into the van and turned the radio on. A nice soulful tune played, but before it could permit Kimberly any comforting solitude, it was swifty cut off to make way for an emergency news bulletin.

"In light of ongoing tensions, immigration and uprisings along the perimeter of the Venjix barricade, General Francis Collins of the Silver Guardians announced today that the Silver Guardian programme is to be expanded beyond Silver Hill's limits. The programme will now be able to recruit citizens from neighbouring cities, including ones tied to the very heart of the Imperial Machine mainframe. People who inhabit even the most disenfranchised portions of their respective cities will also be allowed to enroll for a modest fee and Guardian approved accomedation and financial aid"

"Braver world" Kimberly said under her breath.

"Hey" said Jason as he got into the driver's seat.

"Calmer?" Kimberly asked.

"As calm as the waves were on the beach where I met you" said Jason, stroking her hand delicately and admiring the engagement ring he had given her.

Kimberly heard something that made her glance at the rear-view mirror. The van was surrounded by hooded men brandishing firearms.

"Machine shocktroopers" said Kimberly.

"What do we do?" said Jason.

"You'll do nothing, let me deal with this" instructed Kimberly.

"Kim, you need back-up" Jason said as Kimberly put something else in his hand.

"No, your job is to find back-up" Kimberly said, giving Jason an electronic wrist device and fastening it to his wrist.

"When I give you the signal, you push down on this, you hear me? No questions, it'll take you to where you need to be"

"Where's that?" said Jason.

"You'll be with friends, you'll be safe, trust me" Kimberly continued, and swiftly exited the van before Jason Newton could say anything else.

Kimberly stormed towards the lead Machine Shocktrooper with thunderous purpose, visible ire on her face.

"Who sent for you?" she said.

The Shocktrooper remained silent, then fell back as two people familiar to Kimberly made their prescense felt.

One carried a sizeable weight of his own. A physical weight to see the least, another was a lanky and thin man with a gnarly laugh. Kimberly reacted with mild surprise and outright disgust.

"Bulk and Skull" she said, "I did'nt think you had it in you to sell us out"

"Told you we'd find out they really were" said Francis Bulkmyer to his friend Eugene Skullovitch. Two high school dropouts turned deadbeat detectives, occasional allies to Kimberly and her friends in their other lives, but their roots were in antagonizing their civilian identities.

"Is this why you were always ducking me on dates?" taunted Skull as Kimberly clenched her fist in anger.

"You never stood a chance my numb Skull, she had two soldiers to choose from, she let a ghost fade and now she's latched onto anyone bearing her other intended's name"

"You keep that mouth shut" ordered Kimberly.

Skull laughed, and turned to the Shocktrooper.

"Her boyfriend is in the van" he said.

"You leave him alone" said Kimberly, glancing over to the van and giving Jason a nod.

Jason took that as the signal and pressed down on the device attached to his wrist. A swilr of hot electrical white energy enveloped him as his corporeal body dissapted and became a blistering streak of light that shot upwards into the sky and hurtled across the heavens.

"Target the energy streak with your destabalizers and open fire" the chief Shocktrooper instructed. His

Kimberly threw off her shoes and nailed the chief Shocktroper with a swift kick to the chest, she then somersalted and grabbed another trooper's head with both feet and twisted it off, she grabbed the head and threw it into another Shocktrooper, leaving it shaken.

Bulk and Skull took cover as the battle escalated, stumblin on one of the fallen Shocktrooper's discarded rifles.

Kimberly found battling the troopers in her dress most discomforting, she tore a portion of the bottom off to give her legs more liberated space, and nailed two more soldiers looming over her with furious flying fists that caught them in the rear of the jaw.

The fight, however, easily tired her. It had been so long since she and Jason had gone on the run, fleeing the city to elope at the nearest legalized chapel at the heart of Stone Canyon.

More was on her mind than the battle cries of old.

She had thought those habits had finally swayed, given in to something new.

How wrong she was.

How very wrong.

And the thought of that was enough to slow her down, wear her down to the point she was left vulnerable just long enough to be clubbed in the back of the head by the butt of an assault rifle.

"What do you know Bulk? I finally nabbed her" Skull said, cackling.

"Bring her in, inform the Skybase that her finace is with The Order" Bulk instructed.

And as Kimberly Hart slipped into unconsciousness, one word danced across her lips, and the darnedest part of it all, was that she wasn't sure who she was calling it out to.

Her head or her heart.

"Jason" she whispered.

Meantime, Jason Newton found himself surrounded by people he did not sense were on the friendly side, no matter what Kimberly had said.

He did not understand what had happened to him, all he knew was he was on the outskirts of where he'd departed from, and he wasn't alone.

Standing over him was a small group of misfits, each looking worse for wear, each with an unknown grudge etched on their faces channeling their emotions.

The leader of this unit was a lean korean man brandishing a battle axe, an eyepatch across his right eye.

"That was some sight...we thought you were somebody altogether different, but I've never seen the likesw of you in all the days I streaked through the sky like that" the man spoke, offering his hand to pick Jason up.

"My name's Adam" he said.

"My, my name's Jason...I..." Jason began, only to be be cut off as Adam stared long and hard at the item he was clutching in his hand.

"Where did you get this?" he asked.

Jason stared at it, he hadn't really focused on what put in that hand of his as everything had happened so quickly.

It was a coin, pink energy encircled it.

Jason Newton, fiance of Kimberly Hart, felt more like a complete stranger.


	2. We Have The Stones

Word of Kimberly's capture soon spread to other cities, including Silver Hills, where a group of teenagers gathered to discuss the matter among other things

"This shit's for real guys, they're even out looking for the other one, you know, the Aussie that replaced her" said one of them as he lit up a cigarette.

"They always said too much pink energy was dangerous" said another.

"Hey, how are you guys doing?" spoke a cagey obese man with a raspy voice.

The teens froze at the man's presence, for he was an officer of the force

"I'm looking for a doughnut shop, anyone know any in this town? I'm kinda new here" he asked.

"We don't want any trouble" said one of the teens, holding up his hands.

"Doguhnuts only cost a couple of cents, I've got plenty of that...but suppose you wanted to rob me...that shit would'nt look good on your rap sheet would it?" said the man, sneering.

"Good thing for your ass I don't have a rap sheet" said the teen defiantly.

"Man, don't be going about intimidating this character" cautioned one of his friends.

"Smart kid, you gotta listen to your peers more" said the man as he slowly approached the teens

"You know why I want to check if there's a doughnut place? It's attractive...that's all, it draws people in...somewhere to sit, somewhere to eat, somewhere to rest...it's cozy, real fine accomedation. You know what it attracts the most? Cops" he continued, now sizing himself and the teen up as they came face to face.

"You laying down the law?" the teen asked.

"Laying down is your part of the job" he said.

The teens could just smell trouble, so they chose to run before anything else could escalate, but the man was quick to grab the teen he was staring down before he could join in on the abrupt exodus.

"Running from an officer on the beat looks real bad on a 'sheet mister" he said as his hands tightened around the teen's throat.

"What do you want?" he said as the grip tightened.

"The higher-ups, the men above even the machines, they want some information gathered, they want to know what the scoop is downtown, see what the underdwellers know, you can go if you cooperate "

"Or what? You going to charge me with anything? You got no shit on me " said the teen, temted to spit in the cop's face but realized all too quickly that would be grounds for such a charge.

The cop took out a small triangular device and placed it on the teen's forehead.

"Give it time...this'll dig up something" he said.

The device glowed bright red, then green, and finally bright yellow, it sent a little shock wave through the teen's cerabellum.

"What the fuck was that?" he said.

"Is'nt it obvious? You got charged" the cop replied, putting the device back in his pocket.

"What did it do to me?" he said.

"Gave me what I wanted, not just what you've discussed in the last couple of hours, but the birth dates, appointments and of all your loved one...even where some of your late reletives are buried"

"What the fuck would you need those for?"

"Some of them might be fresh in the grave...the machines are always looking for an excellent resource for protien with which to feed the scavengers in the more derelict sectors" the cop explained.

"You sick fuck" snapped the teen.

"Society is sick, I'm not the cure, but I supply the place with as best a booster shot as I can manage...you don't want the vaccine I provide? You stay underground and out of my way"

The cop let go of the teen, who swiftly made his exit.

He waited until he made sure he was alone, then called out to someone.

"It's ok, he's gone" he said.

Emerging from the shadows were two twin females, long hair, lean bodies, stilleto heels, with pink and yellow scarfs serving as a means of telling them apart.

"Twins huh? One of you wasn't wearing those scarfs last time, which one of you was my contact?" he asked.

"We'd prefer it if you could'nt tell" said the woman in pink.

"Do you have the details?" the woman in yellow asked.

The cop handed her several of the triangular devices.

"You'll find what you want in here somewhere, the intel gathered on the Silver Guardian's takeover pitch, now give me what I want"

"Handing this over to us can't be easy on your conscience" said the lady in pink.

"It gets easier when I have what I want" the cop asked.

"Ok Lt. Stone, make your way over to 456 Marchand Avenue, your family will be waiting for you with free transport out of the perimeter"

The cop let out a sigh of relief, and did as instructed.

The lady in yellow looked at the devices with a smile of supreme satisfaction.

"We're playing by their rules now...kind of like it" she said

"Not everyday you tell the toughest cop in Silver Hills that we have the stones" said the lady in pink.


	3. What Is Power?

The slums of Angel Grove were littered with waste, and not just the kind you throw in the ground.

Homeless parasites scavenged the alleyways, looking for anything to take thier minds off of thier perilous predicaments and pity parties. They sought a release.

Machine surveillance drones patrolled the cityscape high above, scanning the peasants as they picked up a half-empty bottle of booze, shot themselves up with a well worn needle pumped full of unstable substances.

The scans from the surveillance drones would dictate what medical issues the hobos had, how long they had to live if left unchecked. Many scanned were not given much long to live. They had weeks, some had days.

Rather than relay the information to some kind of higher power, the drones kept the knowledge to themselves. They had been instructed to by the Machine Generals in charge of population control to only supply this data to people they felt made pure for total consumer satisfaction.

These were the mouths to feed, not the riches to be harvested.

As the drones went on their way, observing this was a young girl clutching a teddy bear. She had no legal guardians, no blood relatives, they had been taking to be turned to produce, they had been deemed medically fit to serve. She was spared as a last request.

As she made her treacherous trek across the city, she observed the shattered looks on the faces of those who had not yet grown cold and embittered by their circumstances, these were the hope among the helpless.

To the left of the girl was an elderly man holding up a cardboard sign reading _What is Power?_

"Who will be mighty? Who will be powerful?" said the old man to the child.

"What is power?" the child asked, repeating what she read off the sign.

"An excellent question" the elder said, taking the young girl's hand and walking with her over to a derelict building.

"I know the answer, I know what Power is" the child replied, "It's what we don't have, and if we had it, we'd make things better with it"

"That's what they all say, they'll be healers, they'll be leaders, this time the power lies in different hands, thus it will be different...but they only ever say that when the control has slipped away, into the hands of something more ruthless. When they posses power, it's never different, it's always the same"

"I like things to stay the same, the way my mother remembered it" the girl replied.

The elder patted her on the head, smiling at her, though she was repulsed by both his missing and partially rotting teeth.

"All people with power wish to maintain is the status quo, I knew five people, young and idealistic, who wanted nothing but the same things...time and again, everything proceeding as normal, nothing to see here. Nothing at all" the elder replied, his eyes beginning to glow a bright red.

He walked over to a small birdcage and fed what appeared to be a falcon a peice of meat, the girl could sense a growing tension in the air.

The elder looked back at her, what remained of his teeth peeling away as his face partially melted. The girl screamed, the elder grabbed the head of her teddy bear and tore it clear from it's body, the girl ran as far away as she could, but the elder's voice resonated in her head for a few moments more

Enough to answer his question.

"You want to truly know power?" the voice demanded, "Power knows not what to do with itself, it cannot be contained by any willing body or mind, it can only be used to purge control from chaos, to let naked ambition run rampant without anything keeping it in check. Power exists to be destroyed, and that is what I will do one day, when true power, true chaos, slips through thier fingertips, and into mine, that is what I will act, I will destroy the Power Rangers!"

And the man with Lord Zedd's face laughed.


	4. Ghost Protocall

"Bring her around" the cold, partially rasping voice uttered, a command to two men in black velvet ski masks surrounding an unconscious prisoner.

They produced a small studded pin from their pockets and pinned two of them to the left and right of her neck, then pressed down on their centres.

An eletric jolt surged through the priosner, a woman, and she sparng to life.

"Good, you weren't totally out of reach" the voice continued.

"What the fuck do you do to me Rocky?" said Kimberly as she managaed to recgonize the face of one of her former teammates and friends.

"We gave you a little lapse into the field of eternal dreams...simulated death by condensing the levels of pink energy contained in your body to override the flow of the central artery...a little power play so to speak" he said.

"You should have finished me, but then again, a little Kill Bill can do wonders to motivate the dead" said Kimberly as she tried to budge from her chair, only to find she was shackled.

"Not what we're here for, the information you possess is quite valuable. Besides, after all those years of pachinko addiction, I think I've found a much more entertaining game" Rocky gloated.

"One you'll never win" said Kimberly.

"I've scored a couple of early hits already...remember Zack Taylor?" said Rocky, showing Kimberly the security feed of a warehouse in South Korea, and of an apartment complex situated somewhere in Los Angela, where a frustrated African american was charging his fists passionately into a punching bag, so quick and ferocious were they, it was almost as if the devil were after these hands.

"We picked this up in South Korea a few days ago..he was trying to bust an operation, they were supplying considerable amounts to his hip-hop kiddo classes. So many kids, he was trying to teach them a more physical kind of hit, a much more literal kick, but you know how easily led young souls are"

Kimberly watched on the feed as a black suited Power Ranger crashed through the roof and engaged in hand to hand combat with the drug peddlers, some brandishing knives. One of the Ranger's side kicks smacked a gun clean away from a thug's hand, he reached for it, and, with a soul touched far too easily by temptation, he pressed the trigger and took the dealer's head clean off.

The power of life and death in both their hands, it was a clash of equals between the Ranger and his opponents. The Ranger ducked the shots from other guns and unloaded another round, managing to inflict shoulder wound on the ringleader, he then grabbed a dealer from behind and took control of the arm controlling his weapon with a forceful grip.

Controlling the weapon, the Ranger made the dealer wipe out most of the surrounding henchmen and capped the ringleader in the knee. The Ranger trained the gun on the man he was holding hostage and pulled the trigger once more, resulting in a satisfactory head-shot.

Zack picked up the knife dropped by the ring leader and finished him off, slitting his throat.

The feed cut off, and all that was left was the feed showing Zack Taylor engaging in a fist fit with a punching bag. He detected a swift noise from behind.

"It's all good, get on with it" he said, almost as if were making peace with the God he had appalled by his reckless and murderous display a world away once upon a time.

A powerful blast of firepower smashed through the back of his skull, and he fell to the floor dead.

"It's sad isn't it? Seeing your friends murdered one by one, especially by one of your own...but it's all perfectly legal. Great thing about the Machine justice system is you don't need to be present for a trial to be found guilty if the evidence is stacked against the convict. We get the order, we swoop in for the kill, it's only logical"

"As logical as your turn was?" Kimberly said.

"When the Venjix virus crippled our defense networks and enabled the empire to override most of our nations, I realized who the winning side was...the human race can be a disease, just like this kid I met years ago called Kyte said, they can only be redeemed by assuming the role of the anti-body"

"You're still a traitor" said Kimberly

"No, I'm just not a child, and you're not a little girl, so where's your Prince Charming? Where's Tommy?" demanded Rocky.

"Tommy Oliver is a ghost, you'll never find him, I don't even know where he is" Kimberly insisted

"Bullshit is an ugly color on you" Rocky replied.

He brought up screens of various news reports, all of them were discussing several stings on illegally organized street fights.

"We know the Mariner Bay ''Commissions'' have been hit heavy in recent months. We know it's a Ranger, but some can't quite place who the Ranger in question is, but the same two colors keep being described. Green as envy and clear as White" Rocky explained.

"So I was right" Kimberly said, smiling warmly.

"He is a ghost"

"Yeah, and he's also the fucking boogeyman of this whole operation, and I'm not one to be spooked. For the last time, where is he?"

"I don't know" said Kimberly.

Rocky took a look at a nearby device that was scanning her

"The regular machines don't lie either, they were scanning your beats per second for signs of a fluctuation, they told us exactly what we want to know, your story checks out"

"So you lose" Kimberly said.

"Oh Kim, we never needed you for information, I was stalling so the machines could check your beat. Your testimony one way or the other is meaningless...we have what we need. You as bait"


	5. Cool Amongst Fire

The Mariner Bay street fights were getting too out of hand, but the crowd could not get enough of the conflict.

This latest warrior, weary of the world but eager to prove himself to it, was no stranger to the rigorous gauntlet of combatants that had stepped up to challenge his rule over the harbour region.

"Does any more wish to challenge this man?" said the promoter as he raised the warrior's hand in victory.

The huddled fighters recognised the stranger as Tommy Oliver, a Power Ranger of formidable skill and of many colours.

"I challenge you" he said.

The warrior stepped forward, combat ready.

"That man fights with the spirit of a warrior demon" Tommy revealed

"I'm flattered" the promoter remarked as he read the world warrior's body language.

"It was not intended as a compliment, he has connections to the clan of Diabolico, I would have words with him"

"I do not choose my spirit, but it is bound to me, and it answers to no one" the warrior said, uttering his first lines of the evening.

"Then I shall take it upon myself to exorcise your demon, so you can fight with honour again" said Tommy

"I'm too old for this" the promoter said, and took his leave, as did the others. Soon the street was a clear and ideal battlefield for the two opposing forces.

Tommy stepped forward as the warrior began to unleash a barrage of punches at him. Tommy deflected the blows with his hands and dealt the warrior a slew of dangerous high knee kicks to the face, until the warrior grabbed his right leg, hoisted him high in the air, released him, threw a mean right hook which ignited in fire as he leapt into the air and struck Tommy hard across the chest.

Tommy fell in amongst a row of empty trash cans. The warrior landed gracefully on his feet like a cat and charged at Tommy with lightning quick speed. Tommy jumped clear of his path as the charge shattered the trash cans upon impact.

Tommy removed a handheld device from his belt buckle, it was a morpher, black in design, with fragments of different coins stuck together, Tommy pressed down on the coin represented by a dragon emblem, the morpher began to hum loudly and an electrical surge of power coursed through it.

Tommy held it to the sky and call on the power contained within.

"Dragonzord"

To the warrior's bewilderment, the human plaything transformed into an emerald green combatant, garbed in a glowing yellow shield.

The warrior spun feverishly into the air, a twirling roundhouse kick attempting to connect with the Power Ranger, but Tommy grabbed his leg mid-flight and spun him counter clockwise, before grabbing the back of his shirt and ploughing him through the back of a warehouse wall.

The two continued to clash wildly, now on equal footing with one another. Their battle tore the warehouse's interior apart. Barrels of oil were knocked over and ignited by powerful radiant bursts of energy pouring from the warrior's hands.

As a circle of fire surrounded the two, Tommy raised his hands in the air and called forth a darkly shaded and tall blade.

The warrior recognised the weapon.

"A Sword of darkness...so you fight with a demonic spirit too"

"I use this weapon merely as last result, it can purge you of your curse if you let it"

"My curse?" asked the warrior, puzzled.

"Does the name Adminisalar mean anything to you?"

"I destroyed him" the warrior replied.

"No, you thought you did, but he possessed you, let me release your soul from his grasp"

The warrior's voice grew deeper, a loud echo now accompanied it.

"This is my nightmare, you shall not awaken him" he said, his clothes changing from brightest white to murky purple. A venomous tongue licked his lips and he set forth a barrage of firepower from his fingertips which struck against the sword of darkness.

Tommy could feel the sensation of searing heat, but he did not falter, he kept cool amongst fire and thrusted the sword forward, the blade threw the energy back at the warrior and he was consumed by it. An odious looking spirit was thrown from his body and found itself pulled into the sword. Tommy stood over the fallen warrior, and reached out with his hand.

"Come, Adminisalar belongs to a new nightmare" Tommy replied

The warrior grabbed his hand in gratitude.

"Thankyou" he said.

"I need you to tell me where Cassidy Kornell is, sources say you were the last to see her"

"China district...but hurry, Adminisalar sent agents of combat after her" he replied.

Tommy nodded and teleported away, leaving the warrior with his thoughts, and a soul forever freed.


End file.
